Many of our greatest "American" artists were, in fact, naturalized Americans born abroad. Some, like Mark Rothko and Louise Nevelson, came as children and were trained in the United States. Others, like Hans Hoffman, Willem de Kooning and David Hockney, came as adults, seeking refuge or creative freedom in the United States. All made major contributions to our "American" culture, as do many foreign-born visual artists today.

We have no way of knowing how many great artists perished in Europe during World War II because our Govrenment refused to let them enter the United States, due to their religion or country of origin.

And if the Trump Administration's Travel Ban takes full effect---denying entry to all Muslims, or all Muslims from certain countries in the "watered down" version---we'll never know what they might have contributed to our culture, either.

NOBLE LAUREATE JOSEPH STIGLITZ, the nation's foremost political economist, spent over an hour at CK/RFA on Thursday, April 20th. Speaking to a packed gallery, he spoke about income inequality, globalization and why Trumpian economics is likely to make things worse, not better, for the vast majority of Americans.

Nancy Ohanian's political illustrations cut through the clutter, the noise, the hype and the fog. She portrays Donald Trump as he is: reckless, unprepared, greedy and power-hungry. Notice how, in this illustration, he has the GOP wrapped around his little finger. OPENING Friday, 17 March, 2017

Renown pianist and founder of Washington's Russian Chamber Art Society, Vera Danchenko Stern knows what it's like living in a country where artwork, books, films and even music must be approved by the State. In the Soviet Union, where Vera was born and trained at Moscow's prestigious Gnessin Institute, many artists lived by their wits, suffered for their art and stood their ground against a government and ideology that tried to repress their creativity and crush their spirit. Would American artists be as tough and as brave if the same thing happened here?

This exhibit is one gallery's response to the US intelligence community's finding that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his country's military intelligence and cyber warfare services to carry out a largely successful psychological cyber warfare operation (psyop) beginning early in 2016 for the purpose of undermining the credibility of the recent presidential election and later in support of Donald Trump's campaign to become the 45th President of the United States.

The Age of Acquire'us exhibit is presented as a reminder, and warning, that history is littered with authoritarian rulers---Peron in Argentina, Stalin in the Soviet Union and Ghadafi in Libya, to name just a few---who, once in power, felt the need to silence their critics as an act of revenge---or out of fear of popular revolt. By presenting works of propaganda art and "Non-conformist" art permitted and banned, respectively, by the Soviet Union's communist government over half a century, alongside political art created by American artists that would almost certainly be banned if President Trump were to act on some of the threats he made during the campaign, the exhibit hopes to alert Americans to the risks and dangers that could lie ahead.

A juried exhibition of contemporary fine art unlike any presented before in the United States. It challenges America's artist's to create political art that deconstructs the major controversies, fundamental policy issues and personality characteristics shaping the 2016 Presidential election campaign, providing America's voters with powerful visual images that will help bring clarity to one of the most divisive and bitterly contested elections in our Nation's history.

There are many different ways to make prints, and Annie Bissett has mastered one of the oldest and most difficult, moku hanga, dating from 16th Century Japan. Moku hanga is unusual because there's no press involved; the print maker carves a block of wood (or several blocks of wood, one for each color) then creates the print by pressing the woodblock, coated with watercolor paint, against damp paper, by hand. The woodblock carving is painstaking and requires great skill, especially for Annie's prints because they are often extremely intricate and multi-colored, which means as many as five or six different carved blocks.

There is no better example of the art of protest and political change than the now iconic logo Jerzy Janiszewski created for the Solidarity trade union movement in 1980.. Janiszewski’s graphic design --- with its original typeface, blood-red letters and the Polish flag emerging out of the letter “N” (for nation) --- was both visually powerful and inspirational, quickly becoming a generic symbol of freedom and democracy recognized throughout the world.

Among the 25 works on display in this first retrospective of Janiszewski’s work will be the very first imprint of the logo, signed by Solidarity’s leader, Lech Walesa. Other hand drawn and historic graphic imprints of the logo signed by Janiszewski, never before exhibited, will also be displayed and these will be offered for sale.